Valheim server hosting

Valheim officially supports up to 10 players on a dedicated server. LOW.MS offers plans from 10 to 64 slots, with the larger slot counts intended for communities running mods that lift Valheim's vanilla 10-player cap. The vanilla game is best experienced with 2-10 players.

Yes. Since the 1.0 launch on 9 September 2026 it covers every platform: PC, Mac, Linux, Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S, plus PlayStation 5 and Nintendo Switch 2. Crossplay has to be enabled at both ends, on the server and by the joining player. On our servers it's one setting. Tick Crossplay in the General group on the Manage tab, save, and restart the server. Once it's running, console and Game Pass players join with a six-digit join code rather than an IP and port. The panel shows that code on your server's Overview tab, and it changes every time the server starts. With crossplay on, everyone connects through Valheim's PlayFab relay, which can add a little latency even for Steam players, so leave it off if your whole group is on Steam. One myth worth correcting, because we used to repeat it here ourselves: enabling crossplay does not stop BepInEx mods loading. The flag only moves the server onto a different matchmaking backend and leaves the mod loader alone. The real limit is that console players can't install client-side mods at all, so anything client-side shuts them out whatever the server is running. Server-side mods are fine either way. There's a full walkthrough in our crossplay and join codes guide.

Absolutely. Valheim has a thriving mod scene built on BepInEx and Thunderstore, with thousands of mods available, from quality-of-life tweaks and building tools to performance optimisers and full gameplay overhauls. Open your server's Mods tab to search the Thunderstore catalogue and install with one click. BepInEx and anything a mod depends on are installed alongside it, so there's no manual setup. If the mod you want isn't in the list, copy its link from thunderstore.io and paste it into Install from URL. After a big update like 1.0, check a mod's Thunderstore page shows a recent release before you add it, because older builds may not load. Worth correcting something this answer used to say: mods and crossplay are not mutually exclusive. Turning crossplay on doesn't stop BepInEx loading, and server-side mods keep working normally. What does bite is the console side, because Xbox, PlayStation and Switch players can't install client-side mods at all. So if you want console friends in the world, stay vanilla or stick to server-side-only mods. Our mod installation guide walks through the whole process.

You can connect three ways: through the Steam server browser, through the in-game Join Game menu, or, if you have crossplay enabled, using a six-digit join code for cross-platform play. Your server's address, the IP and port together, is shown at the top of its page in the LOW.MS panel. In Steam, go to View, Servers, then Favorites and Add a Server, and enter the port one above your game port, because that's where Valheim answers the browser. In game, choose Join Game and find your server under the Community tab, or use Add Server with the address. A newly started server can take a few minutes to show up in the community list. The join code works differently, because it comes from the crossplay backend rather than from us. The panel picks it up from the server log and shows it on your Overview tab. It's tied to the session, so it changes every time the server starts. Worth checking it again after a restart or an update.

Yes. Your world is in your local saves folder ("worlds_local" inside %appdata%\..\LocalLow\IronGate\Valheim). Since Valheim 1.0 a world is a folder named after it, full of .chunk files, and the whole folder is what you upload. A world nobody has opened since before 1.0 is still a .db and .fwl pair, and that works too: upload both files and the server converts them to a folder the first time it loads them. Stop the server, then on the Files tab open config/valheim/worlds_local/ and use Upload folder for a 1.0 world, or Upload for an older pair. If a world with the same name is already there, delete it first so the two don't mix. On the Manage tab, set World Name to the world's name exactly as it appears on the folder (or the files, without the extension). The field suggests the worlds already on your server, 1.0 world folders included. Set World Modifiers to match how you played, because the server applies the panel's values on every start, then start the server. Our save location guide has the step-by-step. If you play through Game Pass rather than Steam, your world sits in cloud storage first. From the Valheim main menu choose Manage Saves, then Move to Local, and it drops into worlds_local. Worlds created on an Xbox console can't be exported at all. For what does and doesn't carry across, including the fact that characters stay on each player's own machine, see How to Move a Valheim World to a Dedicated Server.

There are two separate systems here, and it's worth knowing which is which, because they protect you from different things. Valheim runs its own backups with no setup from you. By default the world saves every 30 minutes, and the server keeps a rolling set of four backups next to the world. You can change both in the Saves & Backups group on the Manage tab. That happens on every Valheim server we run, and it covers you for a crash or an unclean shutdown. LOW.MS backups are the second layer, and they're the ones that save you from what Valheim's own set won't: a bad mod update, a world you've overwritten, a rollback you only noticed three days later. Create backup on the Backups tab writes a copy off the server, and a Backup task under Scheduled tasks on the Settings tab does the same on whatever schedule you pick. Restoring is on the Backups tab too, with the server stopped. I'd set that schedule up on day one rather than the day you need it. Most people don't, and then a big update day arrives.

A vanilla Valheim server runs comfortably on 4-6 GB of RAM, but modded servers and worlds with large builds benefit from more. Every LOW.MS Valheim plan includes at least 10 GB of RAM, rising with slot count to 20 GB on the 64-slot plan, significantly more than most competitors who include only 2-4 GB at their base tier. If you need more, you can add extra RAM when you order.

Open the Players tab and add yourself under Admins. A Steam player goes in as their 17-digit SteamID64, and an Xbox or Game Pass player as Xbox_ followed by their ID, which is case sensitive. You can look up a SteamID64 at steamid.io or read it off the Players tab once that player has connected, and an Xbox player can find theirs in the F2 panel in game. The same tab holds your Banned list and Whitelist. The server builds adminlist.txt from the panel's list every time it starts, so manage admins there rather than editing the file by hand. Once that's done, the vanilla admin commands that actually work on a dedicated server are kick, ban, unban, banned and save, plus help, ping and info. Two commands you'll see listed elsewhere are worth knowing about: noportals is real but doesn't work remotely on a dedicated server, and lodbias only changes rendering on your own client, so neither does what most guides claim. Valheim's full devcommands set (god mode, fly, spawn and so on) is restricted to single-player by Iron Gate and doesn't work on a vanilla dedicated server either. If you want that on a dedicated server, install the Server devcommands mod by Jere Kuusela from the Mods tab.

Your Valheim is set up instantly after payment, allowing you to start hosting without delays.

Yes! Our user-friendly control panel gives you full control over game modes, maps, and server configurations over your Valheim server.

We provide 24/7 support for your Valheim server through live chat and email to assist you with any questions or technical issues.

Absolutely. If you're not satisfied with your Valheim server. We provide a full refund within the first 5 days.

Our Valheim servers use top-tier Intel or AMD hardware to ensure your server runs super smoothly!